World University Games in Izmir, Turkey - 05

On Friday the 5th of August 2005, we headed off to Izmir, Turkey. The journey to Izmir was long and painful with stopovers in Singapore, Frankfurt and Munich, before finally arriving in Izmir at 4pm on the Saturday the 6th. The Athletes Village was an incredible site with 64 brand new blocks with each having 16 units which held up to 14 people. I was in block 18, unit 12 with all the diving girls!

The diving pool was in a beautiful location at Narlidere Yuzme Havuzu which was about 20 minutes from the village, and very close to the beach. It had 2 x 1m and 2 x 3m boards, all of which were brand new and great to dive on! The weather was fantastic, no wind in the mornings and in the afternoon a light breeze, it is the best outdoor pool I have ever dived at with Montreal a close second.

On the 11th of August was the opening ceremony which was heaps of fun but really, really long! I swapped heaps of pins, koalas and my hat - hence the new Polish hat. The stadium was packed with over 50,000 people, and there were the snipers on the roof!

The women's 1m event was on the 14th of August and was the first event of the program. Competiting for Australia was Amey, Alex and me. I was particularly nervous as I had hit both of my hands on the board the day before doing 303B. I couldn't grab my hands for entry as they were swollen, bruised and very sore. At 10am the competition started I was diver 22 out of 29. I actually dived quite well to finish 8th and therefore through to the semi finals. I was in the first semis and dived well except for 303B where I went through a bit short. In the end I finished 11th and Alex was 12th.

A few days later was the women's 3m event, luckily my hands were much better. Competiting for Australia was Amey, Carlie and me. Again I was at the back of the field, diver 30 out of 33. I did a good 405C and 205B, 305C was short for 4's (woops), 107C and 5335D weren't too bad. I was 12th going into semis and Amey was 14th! My semis were solid with a score of 210 points, this moved me up to 10th spot, but 7th as only semi scores get carried over to finals. There was a bit of a break to finals so we went down to the resturant on the beach and had a few drinks (mine weren't alcoholic of course) and relaxed. I dived much better in finals to finish 6th with a score of 501 points, to finish after Guo Jingjing, Wu Minxia, Paola and Jashia from Mexico and Misako from Japan.

Two days later was the final day of competitions and Amey and my 3m synchronised event. the event was a straight final which started at 1pm. Amey and I were team number 9 out of 11, and dived after the girls from Korea. Our first dive was the 101/401B combo dive, it was ok. Our next dive 403B was better, and 405C wasn't too bad either. I did a much better 305C than in the 3m event two days earlier, Amey's went over but we still got good scores. We knew we were in 4th place going into the final round. Our final dive was 205B, we knew we both needed to nail it to be a chance for a medal, and we did it!! We got 8's all round and moved ahead of the Ukranie girls to get the Bronze medal! Our Bronze medal was the first diving medal from Australian females.

The next day we went to Cesme, a beautiful beach of white sand and blue water. The closing ceremony was also on the 21st of August, which was heaps of fun. I had the privilage of carrying skippy the inflatable kangaroo around and had tons of photos taken with skip. Everyone was undressing and swapping their uniform. I swapped a few items, I got Japanese bathers and tee-shirt, USA polo shirt, Swiss shorts and top.

It was a great trip, heaps of fun and full of memorable experiences. Again there were many positives to come out of the trip, which helps me stay motivated to train hard and dive well.